Germany’s year-ahead power futures prices fell this week to the lowest level since the beginning of the year amid falling European natural gas prices as talks on a peace deal in Ukraine began.
Russia claimed it damaged ground infrastructure of one of the largest natural gas storage sites in Ukraine’s Lviv region during a series of attacks on the country’s energy sector on Wednesday.
Even as Russian troops and tanks moved into Ukraine in February 2022, Russian natural gas kept flowing through the country’s pipeline network — set up when Ukraine and Russia were both part of the Soviet Union — to Europe, under a five-year agreement.
Ukraine has identified 238 tankers it said belong to a shadow fleet of ships that Russia is using to keep its oil and fuels moving around the world, with hopes this information (which the west has had for years) will force western authorities to sanction the carriers.
Russia halted gas supplies to Austria’s OMV (OMVV.VI), opens new tab in mid-November amid a contractual dispute and legal wranglings related to interrupted gas supplies in 2022.
Despite the stoppage, overall Russian gas exports via Ukraine, which account for just under half of Moscow’s total gas flows to the continent, have remained stable as other buyers stepped in.
Russia halted supply to Vienna-based energy company OMV over contractual dispute in mid-November, but overall gas exports to Austria have remained stable as other companies have stepped up their purchases.
The current five-year gas transit deal between Russia and Ukraine expires on Dec. 31 and Kyiv has repeatedly said it would not engage in talks with Moscow over an agreement extension.
“These Russian attacks on Ukrainian life can be stopped,” he said. “With pressure, sanctions, blocking the occupiers’ access to the components they use to create the tools of this terror, arms packages for Ukraine, and a resolve that must be unwavering.”
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